CORE Metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk Provided by Periodica Polytechnica (Budapest University of Technology and Economics) PP Periodica Polytechnica Why Public Bus is a Less Attractive Transportation Engineering Mode of Transport: A Case Study of Putrajaya, Malaysia 47(1), pp. 82-90, 2019 https://doi.org/10.3311/PPtr.9228 Muhamad Nazri Borhan1*, Ahmad Nazrul Hakimi Ibrahim1, Creative Commons Attribution b Deprizon Syamsunur2, Riza Atiq Rahmat1 research article Received 24 March 2016; accepted 11 July 2017 Abstract 1 Introduction This paper investigates the constraints that limit the use of pub- Antrop (2000) defined urbanisation as a complex process lic bus by people commuting to work in Putrajaya, Malaysia. which transform rural landscapes into urban ones, forming star- Putrajaya was built to replace the city of Kuala Lumpur as shaped spatial patterns controlled by the area’s physical condi- the new administrative centre for the government of Malaysia. tions and accessibility by routes of transportation. The level of This research adopted qualitative methods which involved a urbanisation in the world in the mid-19th century was predicted total of 29 respondents who use car and/or bus to commute to to range between 4 and 7% compared to the level of urbani- their workplaces. The findings of this study show that several sation at around A.D. 1600 and the beginning of 19th century factors, such as reliability, safety, and customer service, play of only 1.6% and 2.2%, respectively. Urbanisation progressed considerable roles in promoting the use of public transpor- rapidly in the region of Western Europe and North America tation. The respondents agree that reliability (e.g. frequency, during the early industrialisation era. According to Antrop punctuality, and transfer) is an important factor in choosing (2004), urbanisation is one of the most important factor in a particular mode of transport. Safety is one of the major European civilisation. In European countries, the percentage concern amongst the respondents, which need to be improved of people living in urban area has reached approximately 80%. along with customer satisfaction of the public bus service. The As with developed countries, developing countries, such results of this study suggest that a more reliable and accessible as Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, also experienced urbani- service is required to promote public bus as an attractive mode sation. However, urbanisation in these areas progressed in a of transport. different way from that experienced by developed (western) countries. Murakami et al. (2005) highlighted that Jakarta Keywords (Indonesia) and Bangkok (Thailand) experienced similar trend public bus, car use, service quality, qualitative research of decreasing population density in the city centre, while in the same study found that Manila (Philippines) showed a different trend. During the growing era of urbanisation, accessibility and transportation infrastructure become the most important factor (Lewis and Maund, 1976). Malaysia too goes through the urbanisation phenomena. This phenomenon has resulted in increased demand for trans- portation. The demand for transportation is proportional with the rapid migration of people from rural to urban areas. Most urban areas in developing Asian countries such as Malaysia are densely populated and urban transportation in these areas rely on land-based transportation such as cars and motorcycles as well as rail-based transportation, namely commuter trains, light 1 Department of Civil and Structural Engineering, Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment, rapid transit (LRT), mass rapid transit (MRT), etc. The expen- Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, diture (e.g. fuel and toll costs) incurred for commuting in urban 43600 Bangi, Selangor, Malaysia areas takes as much as 5 to 15 percent of household income 2 Faculty of Engineering, USCI University, (Tangphaisankun et al., 2010). 56000 Cheras, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Presently, most Malaysians dependent on private cars to com- * Corresponding author, e-mail: [email protected] mute from one place to another. This is evident from the fact 82 Period. Polytech. Transp. Eng. M. N. Borhan, A. N. H. Ibrahim, D. Syamsunur, R. A. Rahmat that the percentage of car ownership in Malaysia is constantly service which reduce travel time and which cannot be achieved increasing every year. As many as 48.5% of all the vehicles reg- when using public transportation. Furthermore, in addition to istered in Malaysia in 2013 are private cars (Road Transport not being able to cater for individual destinations, buses are Department, 2014), which is the highest amongst all types of also associated with delays and its service may not be avail- vehicles. The increasing ownership of cars has not encouraged able when needed. This has resulted in lack of trust in pub- people to use transport as the main mode of transport. One of the lic transport and discouraged people from using them (Nutley most remarkable findings with regard to the use of public trans- and Thomas, 1995). On the other hand, private cars could meet port in Kuala Lumpur is that it has dropped from 35 percent in commuters’ demand in terms of travelling as well as providing 1980 to 16 percent in 2007 (Gakenheimer and Zegras, 2004). ample space for baggage; they are also child-friendly. Cars pro- The increase in ownership of private cars has ultimately led to vide safety and privacy to the driver and passenger(s). Having traffic congestion and slow commute. Public transportation is control over their travel gives additional satisfaction to the also said to contribute to traffic congestion since the speed of drivers (Cameron et al., 2004). These factors have ultimately traffic on major roads in Kuala Lumpur is only between 10 km/h discouraged people from using public transport, especially to 35 km/h during peak hours (Mohamad and Kiggundu, 2007). when it comes to daily commute, Therefore, efforts need to be Putrajaya, the new federal administrative region of Malaysia, made to implement measures which reduce the attraction of is located 20 km from Kuala Lumpur International Airport using private cars (Garling and Schuitema, 2007). (KLIA) and 25 km from Kuala Lumpur City Hall. Putrajaya This study presents the findings of a qualitative study involv- comprises of 20 Precincts. The city occupies an area of 4,931 ing the opinions of both public transport and private car users hectares and has a population of 67,964 (Borhan et al., 2014). in Putrajaya. The research questions addressed in this study Putrajaya has contributed to the further increase in the owner- are: Why is public transportation not a very popular mode of ship of private cars in the city centre. Putrajaya has a unique transport amongst employees? How do employees rate the level transport policy which aim to achieve 70% sharing of public of public transport services? To answer these questions, an transport in its core areas. The public transportations available in-depth interview was conducted with employees who work at in Putrajaya are bus, taxi, and KLIA Transit. However, the cur- the Malaysian government administrative centre of Putrajaya. rent modal split between public transport and private transport The paper begins with a brief discussion of the research meth- is 15:85 (Borhan et al., 2014; Nor et al., 2006). Several facili- odology adopted in this study, including the respondents and the ties, such as the ‘park and ride’ service, have not been success- data collections process. The next section presents the results of ful in attracting commuters to use public transport. The public the study, followed by discussion in Section 4. The limitations bus service operating in Putrajaya is not popular due to tardiness of the study is discussed in Section 5. A conclusion with overall and long travel time. The Malaysian government began to shift summary of the findings is presented in Section 6. the administrative centre of the country from Kuala Lumpur to Putrajaya on June 2, 1993. Between 1993 and 2010, a total of 2 Methodology 25 ministries and 51 government agencies have been moved Qualitative research refers to an approach which explore entirely to Putrajaya, creating 254,000 employment opportuni- human experience, perception, motivation, and behavior ties (Putrajaya Corporation, 2010). These figures indicate the (Parahoo, 2006). Quantitative method may present information expected increase in the number of cars in Putrajaya as a result in numerical form, which involve a variety of statistical meth- of this migration of work force. With the declaration of a new ods. There are many options for collection and analysis of data government administrative centre, the price of properties in in a qualitative study, such as semi-structured and in-depth inter- Putrajaya have also recorded a sharp increase compared to the views; focus groups or group interviews; observational methods; price in surrounding regions. This has caused an imbalance in video and audio recording; participative or action research; and the infrastructure of the Putrajaya city centre which require res- documentary analyses, including analysis of visual materials. In idences to be built outside the city. With job opportunities being addition, a qualitative study investigates the answers to the ques- concentrated mostly in the city centre, the commuting patterns tions of ‘what’, ‘how’ or ‘why’ which surround a phenomenon of workers have resulted in peak hour congestion on major rather than the question of ‘how many’ or ‘how much’ (Green & roads and highways in both directions (in and out of the city). Thorogood, 2004). Many qualitative studies aim to understand Furthermore, the increased participation of women in industries social situations from the perspective of the people receiving in response to the increasing demand in the labour market has services or the service providers (Britten, 2011). One of the contributed to the increase in the ownership of private cars. advantages of qualitative research is that it requires smaller There are many factors which make private cars more pop- sample sizes compared to quantitative research (Patton, 1990).